The Court of Appeals. FILE PHOTO
MANILA, Philippines–The Court of Appeals (CA) has dismissed with finality the plea of alleged pork barrel scam mastermind Janet Lim-Napoles to have the serious illegal detention case filed against her by whistle-blower Benhur Luy.
In a two-page resolution dated July 8, the appellate court’s Former Special Third Division dismissed for lack of merit Napoles’ motion for reconsideration, saying the issues that she raised were a rehash and of issues that had been passed upon in the CA’s original decision issued in March.
“The issues raised in the instant motion have already been judiciously evaluated and passed upon in our aforementioned decision. We, therefore, find no compelling reason to modify or reverse the same,” the resolution, written by Justice Ramon Garcia, said.
Division members Justices Rebecca de Guia-Salvador and Vicente Veloso concurred in the ruling.
The appeals tribunal reiterated that it could not find any error committed on the part of the prosecutors and the Department of Justice Task Force on Anti-Kidnapping in filing the case against Napoles and her brother Reynald Lim.
There was no grave abuse of discretion committed by the Makati City Regional Trial Court either when it issued warrants of arrest for Napoles and her brother, the court said.
The case stemmed from a complaint filed by Luy against Napoles, his estranged cousin and former employer, whom he accused of forcibly detaining him for two months from December 2012.
Napoles reportedly got mad at Luy after she discovered that he had secured a P5.5-million loan using her name and without authorization. She also accused Luy of stealing P300,000.
Luy, however, countered that he was detained by Napoles to prevent him from exposing her transactions involving lawmakers’ congressional pork barrel—officially called the Priority Development Assistance Fund (PDAF)—to the tune of P10 billion, which was reportedly siphoned through phony nongovernment organizations she founded.